Part 8 (2/2)
While the belligerent spirit of Congress had abated somewhat since the last session, no such change had pa.s.sed over the gentleman from Illinois. No sooner had the Texas resolution been dispatched than he brought in a bill to protect American settlers in Oregon, while the joint treaty of occupation continued. He now acquiesced, it is true, in the more temperate course of first giving Great Britain twelve months' notice before terminating this treaty; but he was just as averse as ever to compromise and arbitration. ”For one,” said he, ”I never will be satisfied with the valley of the Columbia, nor with 49, nor with 54 40'; nor will I be, while Great Britain shall hold possession of one acre on the northwest coast of America. And, Sir, I never will agree to any arrangement that shall recognize her right to one inch of soil upon the northwest coast; and for this simple reason: Great Britain never did own, she never did have a valid t.i.tle to one inch of the country.”[211] He moved that the question of t.i.tle should not be left to arbitration.[212] His countrymen, he felt sure, would never trust their interests to European arbitrators, prejudiced as they inevitably would be by their monarchical environment.[213] This feeling was, indeed, shared by the President and his cabinet advisers.
With somewhat staggering frankness, Douglas laid bare his inmost motive for unflinching opposition to Great Britain. The value of Oregon was not to be measured by the extent of its seacoast nor by the quality of its soil. ”The great point at issue between us and Great Britain is for the freedom of the Pacific Ocean, for the trade of China and j.a.pan, of the East Indies, and for the maritime ascendency on all these waters.” Oregon held a strategic position on the Pacific, controlling the overland route between the Atlantic and the Orient. If this country were yielded to Great Britain--”this power which holds control over all the balance of the globe,”--it would make her maritime ascendency complete.[214]
Stripped of its rhetorical garb, Douglas's speech of January 27, 1846, must be acknowledged to have a substratum of good sense and the elements of a true prophecy. When it is recalled that recent developments in the Orient have indeed made the mastery of the Pacific one of the momentous questions of the immediate future, that the United States did not then possess either California or Alaska, and that Oregon included the only available harbors on the coast,--the pleas of Douglas, which rang false in the ears of his own generation, sound prophetic in ours. Yet all that he said was vitiated by a fallacy which a glance at a map of the Northwest will expose. The line of 49 eventually gave to the United States Puget Sound with its ample harbors.
Perhaps it was the same uncompromising spirit that prompted Douglas's const.i.tuents in far away Illinois to seize the moment to endorse his course in Congress. Early in January, nineteen delegates, defying the inclemency of the season, met in convention at Rushville, and renominated Douglas for Congress by acclamation.[215] History maintains an impenetrable silence regarding these faithful nineteen; it is enough to know that Douglas had no opposition to encounter in his own bailiwick.
When the joint resolution to terminate the treaty of occupation came to a vote, the intransigeants endeavored to subst.i.tute a declaration to the effect that Oregon was no longer a subject for negotiation or compromise. It was a silly proposition, in view of the circ.u.mstances, yet it mustered ten supporters. Among those who pa.s.sed between the tellers, with cries of ”54 40' forever,” amid the laughter of the House, were Stephen A. Douglas and four of his Illinois colleagues.[216] Against the subst.i.tute, one hundred and forty-six votes were recorded,--an emphatic rebuke, if only the ten had chosen so to regard it.
While the House resolution was under consideration in the Senate, it was noised abroad that President Polk still considered himself free to compromise with Great Britain on the line of 49. Consternation fell upon the Ultras. In the words of Senator Hannegan, they had believed the President committed to 54 40' in as strong language as that which makes up the Holy Book. As rumor pa.s.sed into certainty, the feelings of Douglas can be imagined, but not described. He had committed himself, and,--so far as in him lay,--his party, to the line of 54 40', in full confidence that Polk, party man that he was, would stubbornly contest every inch of that territory. He had called on the dogs of war in dauntless fas.h.i.+on, and now to find ”the standard-bearer of Democracy,” ”Young Hickory,” and many of his party, disposed to compromise on 49,--it was all too exasperating for words. In contrast to the soberer counsels that now prevailed, his impetuous advocacy of the whole of Oregon seemed decidedly boyish. It was greatly to his credit, however, that, while smarting under the humiliation of the moment, he imposed restraint upon his temper and indulged in no bitter language.
Some weeks later, Douglas intimated that some of his party a.s.sociates had proved false to the professions of the Baltimore platform. No Democrat, he thought, could consistently accept part of Oregon instead of the whole. ”Does the gentleman,” asked Seddon, drawing him out for the edification of the House, ”hold that the Democratic party is pledged to 54 40'?” Douglas replied emphatically that he thought the party was thus solemnly pledged. ”Does the gentleman,” persisted his interrogator, ”understand the President to have violated the Democratic creed in offering to compromise on 49?” Douglas replied that he did understand Mr. Polk in his inaugural address ”as standing up erect to the pledge of the Baltimore Convention.” And if ever negotiations were again opened in violation of that pledge, ”sooner let his tongue cleave to the roof of his mouth than he would defend that party which should yield one inch of Oregon.”[217] Evidently he had made up his mind to maintain his ground. Perhaps he had faint hopes that the administration would not compromise our claims. He still clung tenaciously to his bill for extending governmental protection over American citizens in Oregon and for encouraging emigration to the Pacific coast; and in the end he had the empty satisfaction of seeing it pa.s.s the House.[218]
Meantime a war-cloud had been gathering in the Southwest. On May 11th, President Polk announced that war existed by act of Mexico. From this moment an amicable settlement with Great Britain was a.s.sured. The most bellicose spirit in Congress dared not offer to prosecute two wars at the same time. The warlike roar of the fifty-four forty men subsided into a murmur of mild disapprobation. Yet Douglas was not among those who sulked in their tents. To the surprise of his colleagues, he accepted the situation, and he was among the first to defend the President's course in the Mexico imbroglio.
A month pa.s.sed before Douglas had occasion to call at the White House.
He was in no genial temper, for aside from personal grievances in the Oregon affair, he had been disappointed in the President's recent appointments to office in Illinois. The President marked his unfriendly air, and suspecting the cause, took pains to justify his course not only in the matter of the appointments, but in the Oregon affair. If not convinced, Douglas was at least willing to let bygones be bygones. Upon taking his departure, he a.s.sured the President that he would continue to support the administration. The President responded graciously that Mr. Douglas could lead the Democratic party in the House if he chose to do so.[219]
When President Polk announced to Congress the conclusion of the Oregon treaty with Great Britain, he recommended the organization of a territorial government for the newly acquired country, at the earliest practicable moment. Hardly had the President's message been read, when Douglas offered a bill of this tenor, stating that it had been prepared before the terms of the treaty had been made public. His committee had not named the boundaries of the new Territory in the bill, for obvious reasons. He also stated, parenthetically, that he felt so keenly the humiliation of writing down the boundary of 49, that he preferred to leave that duty to those who had consented to compromise our claims. In drafting the bill, he had kept in mind the provisional government adopted by the people of Oregon: as they had in turn borrowed nearly all the statutes of Iowa, it was to be presumed that the people knew their own needs better than Congress.[220]
Before the bill pa.s.sed the House it was amended at one notable point.
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude should ever exist in the Territory, following the provision in the Ordinance of 1787 for the Northwest Territory. Presumably Douglas was not opposed to this amendment,[221] though he voted against the famous Wilmot Proviso two days later. Already Douglas showed a disposition to escape the toils of the slavery question by a _laissez faire_ policy, which was compounded of indifference to the inst.i.tution itself and of a strong attachment to states-rights. When Florida applied for admission into the Union with a const.i.tution that forbade the emanc.i.p.ation of slaves and permitted the exclusion of free negroes, he denied the right of Congress to refuse to receive the new State. The framers of the Federal Const.i.tution never intended that Congress should pa.s.s upon the propriety or expediency of each clause in the const.i.tutions of States applying for admission. The great diversity of opinion resulting from diversity of climate, soil, pursuits, and customs, made uniformity impossible. The people of each State were to form their const.i.tution in their own way, subject to the single restriction that it should be republican in character. ”They are subject to the jurisdiction and control of Congress during their infancy, their minority; but when they obtain their majority and obtain admission into the Union, they are free from all restraints ... except such as the Const.i.tution of the United States has imposed.”[222]
The absorbing interest of Douglas at this point in his career is perfectly clear. To span the continent with States and Territories, to create an ocean-bound republic, has often seemed a gross, materialistic ideal. Has a nation no higher destiny than mere territorial bigness? Must an intensive culture with spiritual aims be sacrificed to a vulgar exploitation of physical resources? Yet the ends which this strenuous Westerner had in view were not wholly gross and materialistic. To create the body of a great American Commonwealth by removing barriers to its continental expansion, so that the soul of Liberty might dwell within it, was no vulgar ambition. The conquest of the continent must be accounted one of the really great achievements of the century. In this dramatic exploit Douglas was at times an irresponsible, but never a weak nor a false actor.
The session ended where it had begun, so far as Oregon was concerned.
The Senate failed to act upon the bill to establish a territorial government; the earlier bill to protect American settlers also failed of adoption; and thus American caravans continued to cross the plains unprotected and ignored. But Congress had annexed a war.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 186: Message of December 3, 1844.]
[Footnote 187: _Globe_, 28 Cong., 2 Sess., p. 85.]
[Footnote 188: _Globe_, 28 Cong., 2 Sess., App., p. 65.]
[Footnote 189: _Ibid._, p. 66.]
[Footnote 190: _Globe_, 28 Cong., 2 Sess., App., p. 66.]
[Footnote 191: _Ibid._, p. 67.]
[Footnote 192: _Globe_, 28 Cong., 2 Sess., App., p. 68.]
[Footnote 193: _American Historical Review_, VIII, pp. 93-94.]
[Footnote 194: It was voted down 107 to 96; _Globe_, 28 Cong., 2 Sess., p. 192.]
[Footnote 195: _Globe_, 28 Cong., 2 Sess., p. 193.]
<script>